christmas

Advent Reflections Week 3: The God Who is to Come

/ Jana

I went on a crazy rabbit trail with the Lord the other day.  About swaddling cloths. Really? Yeah.

Turns out the details matter to God and ultimately to us when He reveals them.  I have been deep diving into Garments (which will come later).  One thing led to another and the swaddling cloths came into focus where I learned two important distinctions for our Advent meditations.

Speaking of Joseph and Mary traveling to Bethlehem:
“So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered.

And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths,

and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.”  Luke 2:6-7

The first idea is specific shepherds surrounding the birth of Jesus were Levitical shepherds. As such, they were charged with overseeing the conditions of lambs so they would be “spotless and without blemish” for the sacrifices in the temple.

According to columnist, Linda Littlefield, “when the mother ewe was preparing to give birth, she was taken to a special birth place, or to the only cave designated, to give birth to the sacrificial Iambs.

This cave was kept sterile and clean for the arrival of newborn sacrificial Iambs. The newborn lamb was immediately wrapped in clean swaddling cloths to protect them and keep them from blemish and danger.”

So when the angels declared: And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a  manger, (Luke 2) these particular type of shepherds understood from these specific instructions that they were looking for the Sacrificial Child.

Using our spiritual imaginations, we see how Jesus came as the perfect lamb and God left clues, if you will, to help us discover the beauty and wonder of our Newborn King.

Now, look at this next beautiful detail.

After Jesus laid down His life, they again laid his body in the tomb (cave) and again wrapped His body in cloths. But the cloths this time are not swaddling cloths related to sacrifices.  Instead, these cloths, in variations of the Gospels in Greek,  say Jesus was “wrapped in linen cloth.”

Hold on a minute. Linen? Linen is what the saints are dressed in in heaven. Linen robes.

“Let us rejoice and be glad and give Him the glory. For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His bride has made herself ready. She was given clothing of fine linen, bright and pure.” For the fine linen she wears is the righteous acts of the saints. Then the angel told me to write, “Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” Revelation 19:7-8

Let your spirit connect these beautiful dots.

The swaddling cloths were for God’s only Begotten Son, the perfect lamb to be sacrificed.

The linen cloths were for the Beloved to be the first Resurrected of many brothers and sisters.

I don’t know about you. My heart about comes undone.

The God who is to Come. It was always the plan.
Talk about rejoicing.  Amen!

Let your heart worship with this song today.

Advent Reflections Week 2: The God Who Is

/ Jana

The God who IS. The One who is not created, imagined or even ignored. The great I am that I am.

In the most basic way, the Christmas story confronts my Christian story.  The Christmas story is loaded with miracles, the unexpected, the impossible. It turns our socially acceptable religion upside down. Instead of the most likes and plastic fantastics, instead of going through the motions in a powerless life, it is a babe in a borrowed manger bringing a new reality to the whole world. Instead of us having it all together, the Christmas story holds all things together. Instead of settling in my small world thinking, this new born King releases all of Heaven’s glory to me and to you.

We talked about this at the Gala. How God looked at
—the state of our marriages
—the behavior and challenges of our children
—our fear anxiety, sorrow, selfishness
—the deep, deep need to be truly loved and known
—our helpless state to truly fix all that is broken.

And He said, “I know just what they need. I have the Perfect Gift for all of this. “

Yet even in this extravagant offering, He gives us the choice to receive or not receive it. Imagine it. The very Giver of our breath gives us the choice to believe.

“It’s impossible to please God apart from faith. And why? Because anyone who wants to approach God must believe both that he exists and that he cares enough to respond to those who seek him.” Hebrews 11:6

Christmas is an invitation to remember the Gift. To remember Wonder. To remember our faith in the God is so committed to His world that He would give His son. Not one day in heaven, but today. In the tears, sorrow, and madness of today’s world. And to remember the God who is, who rewards those who earnestly seek him.

The wise men. The shepherds. Something pulled them toward Someone greater. May your Christian story be renewed this year by the God who Is.

Enjoy this worship.

An Advent Reflection 1st Week: The God Who Was

/ Jana

We live in a world of multi-layered confusion. “Like the blind we grope along the wall, feeling our way like people without eyes.” (Isaiah 59:10)  So many in and out of church ask questions about our origins, identities, purpose, and calling.

And yet a greater Truth proceeds the resounding “what about me” question.
It is the eternal matter of  I Am—the God who was.

The Ancient of days.
Before the foundation of the world.
In the beginning.

These words shift me. Much like standing on the shore to look out over a vast ocean, I am simultaneously overwhelmed with God’s bigness and my own smallness.

Whatever my life may mean, or hope to mean, whatever my list of needs or weaknesses or desires, whatever deep joy or grief I may experience, there is One who is long before me and long after. There is One whose power is plainly seen daily and whose love is revealed to any open heart.

When we read Isaiah 59 fully we see our great sin and wandering. But the chapter begins and ends with the hope of our Ever Existing, Ever Interceding, Ever Saving God.

1Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear.

21“As for me, this is my covenant with them,” says the Lord.
“My Spirit, who is on you, will not depart from you,
and my words that I have put in your mouth will always be on your lips,
on the lips of your children and on the lips of their descendants
—from this time on and forever,” says the Lord.

As we approach the Christmas season, with its built-in distractions and stresses, let’s pause and breathe in the comfort of The God Who Was.

Enjoy Him in these moments of worship.

Look Full on His Wonderful Face

/ Jana

Jesus Christ is the great leveler.

He creates a level playing field regardless of who you are and where you are.

The shepherds had very little regard or wealth.

The devout carpenter and virgin teenager were simply willing to believe.

The Wise Men knew how to use their intellect and science to follow signs.

The Angels knew the greatest miracle of all was happening

What they all had in common is they personally encountered Jesus.

Not just know about him, or sign a card, or put him in a line up of greatest teachers, they encountered Him.

Mary was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit and conceived Jesus, then went on to deliver her deliverer.

Joseph was led in a dream to not only receive Jesus as the Son of God, but also to protect his new family in a second dream.

The shepherds had the gift of interacting with the heavenly host singing great news.

Wisemen were led by stars in the sky and also in a dream to find Jesus.

All of these God-breathed moments led them to Jesus the person.

The King. The Life changer

God moving into flesh.

I have the seed that’s been planted in my heart in recent weeks.

The notion first came from author Baxter Kruger who talks about what it meant for Jesus to come to earth. We sometimes reduce it to the forgiveness of sin. I know that language, the forgiveness of my sin and your sin, is monumental, earth-shattering.

But Kruger explains how the man in the woman in the garden, when they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they lost their sight of the loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They lost the reality of Presence they had enjoyed up to that moment.

Now blinded, they groped for something to put in place of the true, beautiful, loving, joy-filled, all-providing God. Kruger calls their feeble but deadly replacement, Adam’s god.

Little “g” god.

With increased knowledge of good and evil, they also discovered selfishness, consumerism, hatred, evil, division, deception, lust hopelessness hiding, shame.

Truly they had “fallen” so far from the place of total love, total adoration, the total provision in the presence of the living God, the beauty of the Son, and the power of the Spirit.

God’s solution to disrupted love was to repair our sight through a newborn king. However, Jesus coming in human form did not mean that he was unscathed. God in flesh did not somehow give him a magic bullet to dodge or minimize real life on planet earth.

Our lives on painful planet earth.

Quite the opposite. He walked in our flesh and blood, he experienced our broken emotions, he was tempted to minimize and criticize, he was rejected and scorned, abandoned, wounded, all the things that you and I walk around with every single day, and yet.

The one distinction that Jesus made as his aim and intention was to experience our human brokenness and yet maintain eye contact with his loving Father.

When Jesus says “I only do what I see my father doing,” I think that means far more than we’ve ever considered. Certainly, more than I have ever considered.

Jesus stared down Adam’s little “g” god, stood in the face of all of the brokenness. By doing so, Jesus opened the way for us also to restore our ability to see, restore our connection to the loving Father. Jesus fixed our eyes so that we might maintain our connection with God, locking eyes with the one who made us, loves us, perfects us, heals, and changes us.

Kruger’s notion of Adam’s god sent me diving into the Spirit. I’ve been just swimming around in the spirit trying to unpack and ask for more understanding and revelation.

I just had to laugh because the Spirit brought me a scripture that he showed me years and years ago.

16 But the moment one turns to the Lord[a]with an open heart, the veil is lifted and they see.[b]17 Now, the “Lord” I’m referring to is the Holy Spirit,[c]and wherever he is Lord, there is freedom.

18 We can all draw close to him with the veil removed from our faces. And with no veil, we all become like mirrors who brightly reflect the glory of the Lord Jesus.[d]We are being transfigured[e]into his very image as we move from one brighter level of glory to another.[f]And this glorious transfiguration comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.[g]

2 Corinthians 3

We, with unveiled faces, all reflect the Lord’s glory.

You, like me, have probably heard this verse many times. Heck, I have taught on it many times…

But today I want to share with you the different angle the Lord is sharing with me. We know when Jesus died on the cross, the curtain in the holy of holy‘s was rent from heaven to earth. Top to bottom, the veil was torn open so that we have access to the holy of holy‘s with God: intimate access, intimate connection, intimate proximity.

I love that reality and I also love the visual picture. But this scripture from Corinthian’s has awakened something different for me recently.

I previously thought that God put up that veil.

When I look through the eyes of Adam, seeing Adam’s god, I see all these fears, formalities and legalisms and rules and laws and efforts and pressure and performance.

Even in the middle of my love for God, I still see how that I sometimes put on God that he is not being who I think he should be.

As I have been listening in the spirit, I realize the veil is what I allow to come over my eyes.

When I experience fear and panic and anxiety and hatred and disgust and disappointment, I have allowed a veil to come between me and the true God.

The moment, the very instant, I turn my eyes on Jesus and look full in His wonderful face, the veil is gone and so are all of the distortions associated with Adam’s god.

The bitterness. The hatred. The smallness. The limitations.

The “I can’t, I won’t, I don’t” fades in the light of the glory of Christ.

The glory of his face, the glory of his love and connection to the Father shines through his face to me, to us.

As 2 Corinthians says, the moment one turns to the Lord with an open heart, the veil is lifted and we see. The moment we look for his face with an open heart we see the Lord and where you see the Lord, there is freedom.

Jesus prayed in John 17:

May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

Since Jesus gave us His glory, the glory the Father gave him, why don’t we experience more glory?

Why are we not looking for glory?

Perhaps our eyes are veiled by Adam’s god?

Whenever we see the Holy They for who they really are, the veil is taken away and we see and share their glory and we become bright like stars in a dark and perverse generation.

My invitation to you this Christmas and going forward is will you look on the face of Christ?

Lock on his eyes.

His look of love.

His look of belonging.

His look at acceptance.

His look of compassion.

I’ve been doing this little exercise with the Spirit of God as I try to embrace this revelation down in my own heart. When I feel angry or anxious or forgotten or unloved or abandoned or fearful I just hear in my heart “this is Adam’s god” and I turn back in prayer.

“Spirit lead me back to the face of Jesus.”

Chuck was praying the other morning for God to replace judging and condemning with forgiveness and generosity.

This is the stark reality between Adam’s god and the Living God.

Adam’s god is all about judging and condemning ourselves and others.

The Loving God is all about forgiving and blessing ourselves and others.

We have the opportunity to turn with an open heart, to remove the veil, and see the Lord for who he is and who he wants to be for us. All that we desire, all that our heart can stand, and all that we were born for, Jesus has revealed his glory. He has placed eternity in our hearts and eternity we will have with him. Come, Lord Jesus.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,

Look full on his wonderful face.

Look Full on His Wonderful Face

/ Jana / Leave a comment
Jesus Christ is the great leveler.
He creates a level playing field regardless of who you are and where you are.
The shepherds had very little regard or wealth.
The devout carpenter and virgin teenager were simply willing to believe.
The Wise Men knew how to use their intellect and science to follow signs.
The Angels knew the greatest miracle of all was happening
What they all had in common is they personally encountered Jesus.
Not just know about him, or sign a card, or put him in a line up of greatest teachers, they encountered Him.
 
Mary was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit and conceived Jesus, then went on to deliver her deliverer.
Joseph was led in a dream to not only receive Jesus as the Son of God, but also to protect his new family in a second dream.
The shepherds had the gift of interacting with the heavenly host singing great news.
Wisemen were led by stars in the sky and also in a dream to find Jesus.
 
All of these God-breathed moments led them to Jesus the person.
The King. The Life changer
God moving into flesh.
 
I have the seed that’s been planted in my heart in recent weeks.
The notion first came from author Baxter Kruger who talks about what it meant for Jesus to come to earth. We sometimes reduce it to the forgiveness of sin. I know that language, the forgiveness of my sin and your sin, is monumental, earth-shattering.
 
But Kruger explains how the man in the woman in the garden, when they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they lost their sight of the loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They lost the reality of Presence they had enjoyed up to that moment.
Now blinded, they groped for something to put in place of the true, beautiful, loving, joy-filled, all-providing God. Kruger calls their feeble but deadly replacement, Adam’s god.
 
Little “g” god.
 
With increased knowledge of good and evil, they also discovered selfishness, consumerism, hatred, evil, division, deception, lust hopelessness hiding, shame.
 
Truly they had “fallen” so far from the place of total love, total adoration, the total provision in the presence of the living God, the beauty of the Son, and the power of the Spirit.
 
God’s solution to disrupted love was to repair our sight through a newborn king. However, Jesus coming in human form did not mean that he was unscathed. God in flesh did not somehow give him a magic bullet to dodge or minimize real life on planet earth.
Our lives on painful planet earth.
 
Quite the opposite. He walked in our flesh and blood, he experienced our broken emotions, he was tempted to minimize and criticize, he was rejected and scorned, abandoned, wounded, all the things that you and I walk around with every single day, and yet.
 
The one distinction that Jesus made as his aim and intention was to experience our human brokenness and yet maintain eye contact with his loving Father.
 
When Jesus says “I only do what I see my father doing,” I think that means far more than we’ve ever considered. Certainly, more than I have ever considered.
 
Jesus stared down Adam’s little “g” god, stood in the face of all of the brokenness. By doing so, Jesus opened the way for us also to restore our ability to see, restore our connection to the loving Father. Jesus fixed our eyes so that we might maintain our connection with God, locking eyes with the one who made us, loves us, perfects us, heals, and changes us.
 
Kruger’s notion of Adam’s god sent me diving into the Spirit. I’ve been just swimming around in the spirit trying to unpack and ask for more understanding and revelation.
 
I just had to laugh because the Spirit brought me a scripture that he showed me years and years ago.
 
16 But the moment one turns to the Lord[a]with an open heart, the veil is lifted and they see.[b]17 Now, the “Lord” I’m referring to is the Holy Spirit,[c]and wherever he is Lord, there is freedom.
18 We can all draw close to him with the veil removed from our faces. And with no veil, we all become like mirrors who brightly reflect the glory of the Lord Jesus.[d]We are being transfigured[e]into his very image as we move from one brighter level of glory to another.[f]And this glorious transfiguration comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.[g]
2 Corinthians 3
 
We, with unveiled faces, all reflect the Lord’s glory.
You, like me, have probably heard this verse many times. Heck, I have taught on it many times…
 
But today I want to share with you the different angle the Lord is sharing with me. We know when Jesus died on the cross, the curtain in the holy of holy‘s was rent from heaven to earth. Top to bottom, the veil was torn open so that we have access to the holy of holy‘s with God: intimate access, intimate connection, intimate proximity.
 
I love that reality and I also love the visual picture. But this scripture from Corinthian’s has awakened something different for me recently.
 
I previously thought that God put up that veil.
When I look through the eyes of Adam, seeing Adam’s god, I see all these fears, formalities and legalisms and rules and laws and efforts and pressure and performance.
 
Even in the middle of my love for God, I still see how that I sometimes put on God that he is not being who I think he should be.
 
As I have been listening in the spirit, I realize the veil is what I allow to come over my eyes.
When I experience fear and panic and anxiety and hatred and disgust and disappointment, I have allowed a veil to come between me and the true God.
 
The moment, the very instant, I turn my eyes on Jesus and look full in His wonderful face, the veil is gone and so are all of the distortions associated with Adam’s god.
 
The bitterness. The hatred. The smallness. The limitations.
The “I can’t, I won’t, I don’t” fades in the light of the glory of Christ.
 
The glory of his face, the glory of his love and connection to the Father shines through his face to me, to us.
As 2 Corinthians says, the moment one turns to the Lord with an open heart, the veil is lifted and we see. The moment we look for his face with an open heart we see the Lord and where you see the Lord, there is freedom.
 
Jesus prayed in John 17:
May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
 
Since Jesus gave us His glory, the glory the Father gave him, why don’t we experience more glory?
Why are we not looking for glory?
Perhaps our eyes are veiled by Adam’s god?
 
Whenever we see the Holy They for who they really are, the veil is taken away and we see and share their glory and we become bright like stars in a dark and perverse generation.
My invitation to you this Christmas and going forward is will you look on the face of Christ?
 
Lock on his eyes.
His look of love.
His look of belonging.
His look at acceptance.
His look of compassion.
I’ve been doing this little exercise with the Spirit of God as I try to embrace this revelation down in my own heart. When I feel angry or anxious or forgotten or unloved or abandoned or fearful I just hear in my heart “this is Adam’s god” and I turn back in prayer.
“Spirit lead me back to the face of Jesus.”
 
Chuck was praying the other morning for God to replace judging and condemning with forgiveness and generosity.
This is the stark reality between Adam’s god and the Living God.
 
Adam’s god is all about judging and condemning ourselves and others.
 
The Loving God is all about forgiving and blessing ourselves and others.
 
We have the opportunity to turn with an open heart, to remove the veil, and see the Lord for who he is and who he wants to be for us. All that we desire, all that our heart can stand, and all that we were born for, Jesus has revealed his glory. He has placed eternity in our hearts and eternity we will have with him. Come, Lord Jesus.
 
Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full on his wonderful face.

Remembering the Why

/ Jana

Merry Christmas from Our Greater Things House to Your House

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Friends! Just want to take a deep breath and review all the Lord has done and is doing. We prayed at New Wine Church yesterday, “Lord please don’t let us have Christmas and miss You!” He is so worthy of our praise and adoration.

Through His power and your generosity, Greater Things has discipled multiple groups, with new groups springing off of these original gatherings. The GT house has been used for ministry to inner city teens, prayer meetings, worship nights, New Wine Church, men’s group, Kingdom Moms, The Unveiling Women’s Event, and our still unnamed Wednesday Women’s group. Wink.

We had our largest Beach Retreat to date and I can truly say it was ground breaking.

In addition, God has opened up a whole new territory for us as Chuck has gone on two mission trips this year to the Middle East. God told me while Chuck was gone that he would never be the same. “Part of his heart lives there now,” the Lord said. So we are planning and learning how to love on those from different countries there and also here.

And 2020? I don’t know if you ask the Lord for a word every year, but it is a practice I began years ago under the teaching from John Dee. The how-to is ask God for a word or phrase that He wants to deposit, teach or reveal to you in the coming year. It has been incredible to see Him move in this way and how we spur one another on in the process. Let me just say for this coming year my word is a doozy. I will have to unpack it for you as I get more clarity.

Speaking of clarity, a couple of REALLLLY fun things for 2020:

1) Three books in the writing and refining process.

Whaaat? I know, that was my reaction to God’s instruction too.

It has been remarkable to see Him breathe on the dreams that I have hidden for too long.

2) Another new thing is Listen and See Podcast Not sure why this thrills my soul, but please listen in.

We are talking about topics that matter with some of my favorite people.

3) This is SUPER early announcement, but Kingdom Access School is starting in August. Please stay tuned for more about this!

Where Credit is Due

I want to give a shout out to Caroline Ervin, Sarah Mason, Hailey Keene. These women have been incredible to serve and put strength into the workings of Greater Things. Also a shout out to Jessica Counts, Laura Jones, and Beth Hungerford for the unseen ways they serve the many activities. I want to give thanks to the GT Prayer Team for their incredible intercession. And finally, a shout out to Chad Brooks, Peter Simeone, and Joanna Simeone for beautifying and keeping GT grounds. This goes without saying, but I must shine the light on Chuck Spicka for rocking it as my co-heir. I love doing this with you with Him.

There are so many others who love, give, support my crazy, and benefit Greater Things. Thank you.

You know, maybe you could take a moment to just reach out to the people who help you be you. We really can’t say “thank you” enough. God is so gracious to connect us and help us link arms so that we might advance His Kingdom together.

Okay. My last thought.

This Christmas season, God has ever so kindly asked about my offering to Him. I know we are consumed with gift-giving to others. However, the wise men brought gifts of honor to the King.

The Lord has been breaking it down like this. He is offering me the presence of His Son, fresh and new every year, and what is my response? Will I leave my duties like the shepherds to go and see? Will I treasure what’s right in front of me like Mary and ponder all that God is? Will I bring my costly gifts like the wise men and lay them at His feet because I recognize that I all I need and long for is found in Him?

God gave me this beautiful phrase yesterday: Jesus gets personal when Jesus gets personal. Ask Him and respond to Him. I truly believe these acts of devotion are life-changing.

I bless you with a rich, full of glory Christmas.

With deep love,

Jana

P.S. Just in case you haven’t heard, our giving can now be done online at greater-things.org Thank you. Our ministry is 100% donor funded so we appreciate doing this part together too.

Hilarious Generosity

/ Jana

The Giving seasons are upon us. First we’ll focus on the Giving of Thanks. Then we focus on Giving Tuesday. And then there is the great push, pressure, panic of Christmas Giving. I wanted to share what God is  brewing in my heart about His kind of giving.

Giving of Thanks. Sunday at New Wine Church we just released God Stories. My heart was so full after spending time bragging on our strong, healing, loving Father. Be sure to spend some time with someone you love and count your blessings. I mean it. Make a list and say them out loud. So good for your soul.

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Giving Tuesday.  I have an abundance of ministry emails and letters flowing into my inboxes. My own letter is going out shortly. There must be a better way to navigate all the needs.  Here is one thing to try. For every “asking” letter we receive, or social media fundraiser we read, let’s stop and pray for that ministry. Each group really does need the fullness of Holy Spirit to do what they are doing.

Christmas Giving. Maybe, just maybe, the Grinch had it right. “Maybe Christmas doesn’t come from a store.”

I have been pondering what it means to… slow…down… a… bit… and let the Spirit teach us about how to be generous.

One of my favorite passages on giving comes from 2 Corinthians. The whole chapter is amazing. But for now let’s look at verse 7.

“Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” 2 Corinthians 9:7

Decided.

This word fraught with freedom. We get to choose. Decide. Determine. We get to decide: who is important to us, what issue is moving us, who is feeding our soul and spirit, who is in need?    Obviously God cares THAT we give, but He also cares HOW we give.

Not Reluctant or Under Compulsion

“You must each decide in your heart how much to give. And don’t give reluctantly or in response to pressure. “For God loves a person who gives cheerfully.” NLT

God loves a person who gives cheerfully.  Let that sink in.

Are we more concerned about how we look? Do we feel guilt or pressure to give?  Or, are we motivated by love for the One who loves us, and loves that we give willingly, happily, trustingly, even cheerfully?

We love it when our kids share happily and cheerfully. I think God loves it when His kids do too.

Here is the beautiful equation about generosity. We give because God gives. We give because we trust God to refill our cups. We give because it pulls us out of unhealthy Me-syndromes. We give because we know that God does miracles with our two fish and five loaves.  We practice “hilarious generosity” because it reveals that we are overflowing with the same hilarious abundance that God has.

What do we give?

Money. Sure it’s a real thing. Giving can be a real thermometer for how well we are trusting God financially. No shame here. Just a reality check. It all comes from Him. And He never runs out. So do we feel the freedom to share our money because we know God will replenish? Just sayin’.

There are other resources that God asks us to share as well.
• Our God stories. They are like seeds that reproduce once they are shared.
• Our food, clothes, possessions can be shared. Do we really NEED all that stuff?
• Our wisdom and skills. Others may need what we carry but we have to be willing to share and to sacrifice the time, effort and comfort to give to others.
• Hope. Peace. Grace. Love.  More than cheesy Christian-ese these are tangible resources that we store up and give away to others.

I keep hearing in my spirit, “Am I willing to be hilarious generous all these things?”

Everyone is tapped out during the holidays. So it makes me question if we’re tapping into the overflow of Heaven and giving out of His abundance.

“Yes, God is more than ready to overwhelm you with every form of grace, so that you will have more than enough of everything—every moment and in every way. He will make you overflow with abundance in every good thing you do. “

Listen. I get the squeeze. I am just really confronted with “God loves a cheerful giver.” So what if we give a little less out of obligation and pressure but we give a whole lot more with honesty and hilarity?

Here is more of this passage out of the Passion Translation. Enjoy it. And ask the Spirit how you are doing with generosity. May all your Giving Seasons be full of cheer and overflow.

Hilarious Generosity

6 Here’s my point. A stingy sower will reap a meager harvest, but the one who sows from a generous spirit will reap an abundant harvest. 7 Let giving flow from your heart, not from a sense of religious duty. Let it spring up freely from the joy of giving—all because God loves hilarious generosity!8 Yes, God is more than ready to overwhelm you with every form of grace, so that you will have more than enough of everything—every moment and in every way. He will make you overflow with abundance in every good thing you do. 9 Just as the Scriptures say about the one who trusts in him:

Because he has sown extravagantly and given to the poor,
his kindness and generous deeds will never be forgotten.

10 This generous God who supplies abundant seed for the farmer, which becomes bread for our meals,is even more extravagant toward you. First he supplies every need, plus more. Then he multiplies the seed as you sow it, so that the harvest of your generosity will grow. 11 You will be abundantly enriched in every way as you give generously on every occasion, for when we take your gifts to those in need, it causes many to give thanks to God.

(Quote from Dr Seuss book The Grinch)

The word is — Enjoyment

/ Jana / Leave a comment

So I have been “blogging” away (in my mind)  and thought I would share some of my musings. This is a stretch so hang with me.  It is about kittens, Jesus, and Christmas all in one.

We have two new kittens who are now about four months old. They are Dante and Leo.  I just enjoy them so much. They wrestle. They curl up together. They grab at us from under the bed. But mostly they look for us for snuggles. IMG_5040

Did you catch that? They look for us…As soon as either one of them, see either one of us, they jump up on us and immediately begin purring and try to get as close up to us as they can.

One day , I  was  enjoying Leo stretch out on my lap. His  little orange face was full of bliss. He  was warm, relaxed  and  his  eyes were closed tight as he emitted this lazy purr of contentment.

“This is what it’s like with us,” I heard the Lord say.

“Really?” I asked in disbelief.

“I enjoy it when you enjoy being with Me, like Leo enjoys being with you. Do you see how he just has to get closer and closer to you? I love it when you do that.”

Oh my soul. What do you do with that?

You know I can’t hardly snuggle the cats now without having a ” quiet time” with Jesus. He loves it when we curl up in His arms safe, content, even purring—that inexpressible groan of our spirit connecting with His Spirit.

IMG_0524So this Christ season, take a moment to enjoy the One who came just because He enjoys You.

 

In Conflict, Check the Love Switch

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How do we repair relationships without first repairing our own hearts? The Lord and I have talked a lot about how to walk through conflict —you know, the relational blow-ups  that make you want to throw up? or run away? or cry? or break something?

God is depositing so many revelations about how to do life with others, even when it is messy. He is revealing a beauty in the process that is priceless and is almost worth the pain even. He is teaching me and you how to live as He lives. In Perfect Love.

Revelation One is to assess  why  this conflict is so big on our radar? Why the over the top emotional reaction ( select from prior list or add your own)?  Why go there? God loves you and me. God loves the other person. We are both good.  So let’s take a deep breath and just let the Holy Spirit tweak and heal without all the drama caused by insecurities. There is a peace that passes understanding. Drama steals that peace. So wait on the Lord to bring clarity, truth, and hope.

Speaking of insecurities, that is Revelation Two. We react because we are afraid the love has run out. Danny Silk calls it the Love Switch,  and when we get hurt the first thing we do is turn the Love Switch  off.    We get stung by actions or words and then we question the intentions of the offending person. Does this person really love me? Is this person safe? Without clearly knowing the love connection, the commitment to relationship, it is difficult to trust. So we scramble, attack, hide or blame.

We want to “resolve the problem” but where is the love? We have to let the Lord first heal our hearts through forgiveness and grace so we can get the love back on for that person. Intention is a two way street. How are we communicating our continued love in this hard circumstance? Are we still speaking love and affection even though there is conflict? Through Jesus, is the Love Switch on?

As believers, we know this is a reality that Jesus is pleased to empower because His love is everlasting.  He is teaching us how to love as He loves.  Keep your love switch on. This requires faith. Strong faith that God is truly working all things for your good, but also  for the other person’s good.  (I’m glad He is God. This makes my head hurt.)

“What are you, man, if you do not learn love?”  This question posed by Shawn MacDonald in the song Simply Nothing sums up Revelation Two.

And finally, Revelation Three came by way of  a pertinent blog by Seth Godin. When God is talking, teaching, healing, He brings truth from all directions. Read it and let the Lord have His way in your conflict.  Conflict  is part of our transformation.  We can press in to learn how to enjoy it because we trust the end result.  “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”

Two questions behind every disagreement, by Seth Godin

Are we on the same team? and

What’s the right path forward?

Most of time, all we talk about is the path, without having the far more important but much more difficult conversation about agendas, goals and tone.

Is this a matter of respect? Power? Do you come out ahead if I fail? Has someone undercut you? Do we both want the same thing to happen here?

The reason politics in my country is diverging so much from useful governance has nothing to do with useful conversations and insight into what the right path is. It’s because defeat and power and humiliation and money have replaced “doing what works for all of us” as the driving force in politics.

If you feel disrespected, the person you disagree with is not going to be a useful partner in figuring out what the right path going forward might be. If one party (employee/customer/investor) only wins when the other party loses, what’s the point of talking about anything but that?

Deal with the agenda items and the dignity problems first before you try to work out the right strategic choices. (emphasis added)

The Manger Moment: The Common Denominator

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The manger scene is a wonder to ponder with the poorest of the poor in the shepherds and the richest of the rich in the magi. What a spectrum of humanity it is. Not unlike our own spectrum of Salvation Army bells ringing for donations and registers ringing up designer gadgets and clothing. Yet we will all come to “the moment.” And it will be the same moment for us all, rich or poor.

The gifts will all been opened, and the glee for the “next” will subside.  From the meager gifts of the Angel Tree recipients to the gaudy gifts of the materialists,  the packages will lie unwrapped in a heap, exposed for what they are: more stuff.

And then the moment comes. The manger moment.  In that split second  we ask, we all ask, whether young or old, wealthy or wanting, we ask, “is this all there is?”

This is the very answer they were given at the manger.  Here, wrapped in his mother’s arms, “is all there is.” Jesus is the all in all. He is the first and the last. The rich who became poor only to become rich. He is ancient of Days who became a newborn, the servant who became King. The crucified who rose again. He is the embodiment of the question “is this all there is?” To which He boldly answers, Yes I am. I am the way the truth and the life.

A new song on the radio declares a glorious truth much like the angels did on that first morning:  “our Salvation has a name.”

He is Jesus, Savior,
Son of God, the King of Kings.”
Our salvation has a name.

Jesus, Savior,
Precious Lord of Everything.
Our whole world’s about to change,
And it will never be the same.

He  is one thing that binds us all together… “But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.” Luke 2:10  Beyond the gifts, and the goodies, and the yummies, and the laughter, tears, torment, and longings, Jesus is the great joy that fills in our spirits like no gift card can. Jesus is joy. And He is ours for the taking, if we will only believe.

Don’t miss the answer of the manger moment. Our world will never be the same. Your world will never be the same.